Linked Questions

76 votes
6 answers
104k views

Use of "I", "we" and the passive voice in a scientific thesis [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: Style Question: Use of “we” vs. “I” vs. passive voice in a dissertation When the first person voice is used in scientific writing it is mostly used in ...
oceanhug's user avatar
  • 861
1 vote
2 answers
5k views

Pronoun to use in a one-person report ("I", "we", something else) [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: Style Question: Use of “we” vs. “I” vs. passive voice in a dissertation When I am writing a report I usually use we. What if the project is done by ...
Rein's user avatar
  • 113
1 vote
2 answers
3k views

“We”, “I”, “this author”? [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: Style Question: Use of “we” vs. “I” vs. passive voice in a dissertation Use of “I”, “we” and the passive voice in a scientific thesis For my thesis ...
EnglishWacko's user avatar
1 vote
3 answers
958 views

passive voice in papers? [duplicate]

I'm currently writing a paper for my research however I'm wondering if the usage of the passive voice is correct. for example I wrote like mistakes were corrected were normalized were ...
Bioinformatician's user avatar
46 votes
7 answers
107k views

Is using passive voice "bad form"?

Whenever I create a document in Microsoft Word, it complains about a lot of my sentences being in passive voice. But, when I read that sentence aloud, it sounds fine to me. I am not sure if it is just ...
rest_day's user avatar
  • 4,133
36 votes
3 answers
79k views

Is it recommended to use "we" in research papers?

Is it recommended to use "we" in research papers? If not, should I always use passive voice?
evergreen's user avatar
  • 3,375
16 votes
3 answers
3k views

Who is "we" in my thesis?

in our field (mathematics) it is somewhat standard to write things like " In Chapter 4 we show that ..." "The experiments we have conducted (meaning: me, together with my collaborators) or: " ...
Dan's user avatar
  • 301
9 votes
4 answers
49k views

Rephrase "to the best of my knowledge"

In my master thesis I want to state that I did not find any related work except for one paper. In scientific papers the authors often use the phrase "To the best of our knowledge, ...". However since ...
nico1510's user avatar
  • 193
6 votes
4 answers
7k views

Passive voice in academic writing; why is it not recommended? [duplicate]

When writing academic papers in English I use three different spelling and proofreading tools: Word, Grammarly, and Ginger. In the settings of all these tools, I specify that the document is an ...
Mike's user avatar
  • 351
3 votes
3 answers
1k views

Is it normal in English to talk about oneself in the third person in these cases?

A Japanese person said that it is often normal to talk about oneself in the third person in English. This is what he wrote: For example, when you write a CV or an introduction of yourself, the ...
language hacker's user avatar
5 votes
2 answers
13k views

Using active voice without personal pronouns

When writing scientific research proposals I have been advised to try and stick to active voice because passive tends to sound indirect and to imply doubt. However, when writing in active voice, I ...
John Berryman's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
10k views

Mix active and passive voice in the thesis

I am starting to write my thesis and was told not to use passive voice. But the active voice pronouns "I" and "we" do not sound right somehow and I even found this link How to Write... encouraging ...
MLT's user avatar
  • 191
1 vote
6 answers
344 views

Does the professor think that I'm pregnant?

Yesterday, I handed my assignment to the professor as I was reaching the deadline. For some reason it took a while for her to check my paper, which made me uneasy, but eventually she looked at me in ...
Nate's user avatar
  • 163